ONE AFTERNOON, when House and Anderson were out bouldering, Aslam Rana, House's liaison officer—a government representative that every expedition in Pakistan is assigned—excitedly returned from a visit downvalley to report that a large party headed by Reinhold Messner was setting up its tents at Tap Meadows, the same place the German-Austrian expedition had been based 35 years earlier. " 'Vee camp here!' " a giggling Rana said, mimicking Messner's imperious proclamation.

I walked over at teatime and found Messner at the head of a long table in his mess tent with 15 German trekkers he was leading on a two-week trip around the mountain. At 60, Messner still looked fit, with a bushy beard and that famously thick head of hair. He didn't seem particularly impressed by the details of House's project.

"Yes, the only possibility is the Central Pillar," he said, as if he'd scoped it himself long ago—which he probably had. He did ask one question: Would House be carrying a radio? "I call it my ABC," Messner said. "No Artificial oxygen, no Bolts, no Communication." No radio for House, I told him, though he was planning to use a sat phone from base camp to consult with a weather forecaster. "Ah," said Messner, visibly pleased at this sign of weakness. "But isn't that judgment part of alpinism, too?"

Nevertheless, the next morning Messner, wearing a jaunty Tyrolean hat, strode into our camp. Hussein and Rana pulled out some chairs, and Messner, House, and Anderson sat down for a cup of coffee while a photographer with the German group scuttled around. House was excited; he'd told us the night before that he still has a copy of the Tyrolean's famous alpine-style manifesto, "The Murder of the Impossible," taped to his office wall.

Messner's style at this meeting was more press conference than conversation, though. The only time he seemed truly curious was when House told him he'd climbed with Twight, an author Messner admires because "he has rediscovered the spirit of the 19th-century writing about the mountains." Otherwise, Messner was mostly dismissive. When Ed Viesturs's name came up, for instance—the American had just completed climbing all 14 of the world's 8,000-meter peaks without supplemental oxygen, the famous feat Messner had pioneered—the Tyrolean rolled his eyes.

"Now I hear a woman is trying to do it," he said disdainfully. "It's silly—the most boring kind of climbing."

House grinned impishly. "Yeah," he said. "I wonder who invented that, anyway?" Messner didn't crack a smile.

I'd like to be able to report that, as he left, the world's most famous alpinist cast an envious eye on the younger men or clapped them on the back. But no torches were passed, ceremonial or otherwise. Messner stood and posed for a few last pictures with House, nodded a curt farewell, and strode off at a fast clip, his retinue in tow.

House seemed more amused than disappointed. "He projects this idea that alpinism is over: He did all this stuff; now it's finished," House said. "But, hey, he's still the man."